Hi Andy, tell us a little about you!

My name is Andrew Torrance and I am Veterinary Clinical Pathologist. I founded the Veterinary Pathology Group and currently work 2.5 days per week at the Veterinary Pathology Group laboratory at the Exeter Science Park. The other days of the week are spent on my environmental projects on our two small farms, as well as developing our 35-acre wilding project in North West Devon.

Please briefly describe your current role and professional interests?

Professionally, as a Clinical Pathologist, I do some pastoral, marketing and consulting work with the Veterinary Pathology Group and two days of diagnostic work (predominantly cytology) every week. I still hugely enjoy helping vets, clients and patients by making a diagnosis every 20-30 minutes during the day.

For my environmental projects, I am very interested in landscape design for nature and I am a self-confessed ‘pond-aholic’, I think the next three ponds that are planned on our farm will take my total of "ponds created" to 13!

What does a typical day look like for you?

Let me walk you through the day I had today!

I am an early riser, and after breakfast I walk the dog on our 40 acres of Exmoor combe. It is very steep land, wonderful permanent pasture full of wax caps in the autumn and orchids in the summer. I check the sheep and walk among the 2 ponds we created in the wetland valley. In a week or so's time the smaller pond will be packed with spawning frogs.

I check the hydraulic RAM which is our water supply. We have a gushing spring (a major feeder for the river Exe) pouring out clear cold water said to have come across under the Severn from the Welsh hills before emerging on our Exmoor Farm. The water is channeled via the dam into a holding tank from which the kinetic energy of water pouring downhill through a fat pipe into the pump and through a series of clever valves is thrown up in a thin pipe to our reservoir. The reservoir sits 400 metres up the hill from which we supply spring water to our own house as well as 4 others. We have no solar, no diesel, and no electricity; just water, pipes and valves! A brilliant 18th century invention!

I clear the filter at the dam, the water is really cold on my arm and head back home up the hill. I fill the bird feeders on the way home.

We have incredible birds, today about 20 species including Siskin, they thrive in the old temperate rainforest oak woods of the combe. We also get pied fly catchers by the stream in April.

I drive the truck for an hour or so up to our wilding project in North West Devon in the higher catchment of Tarka's river, the Torridge. Today I am meeting up with a contractor who will be doing the digging work required for our flood plain restoration under Natural England and Higher Tier Stewardship. Its a big job costing around 30-40K to create seepage barriers, ditches, scrapes, bunds and ponds. These will take the flood plain back from the agricultural desert it became to the incredibly fauna and flora diverse wetland it should be. The intention will be for agricultural pollution to be buffered, instead of pouring straight into the river, and water will be held back in the catchment so that it does not overload the canalised river channel and cause flooding down-stream. The meeting goes well, the representative of Devon Wildlife Trust who has helped me hugely with all the paperwork and our contractor make a really good team. We have 2 years to complete the works and we will have to pick the weather window very carefully to avoid the floods and to complete the works and then manage the cash flow!

The walk around the 35 acre site always inspires me. Today the light is catching the incredible muted reds, browns and buff colours of the winter flora (this is culm grassland). There are 20-40 snipe on the marsh, woodcock in the hedges/gorse and mallard and teal on the 2 large ponds/lakes

I grab a bite to eat at Lizzie’s farm shop on the way home. I go over to our second small farm (purchased in 2019), 3 miles from our own place, where my brother and sister-in-law live in the renovated house. The farm was derelict when we bought it, with very special land and engaging wild life including unusually large numbers of hares for Devon. After rebuilding the house during Covid, we put in a water system of 6 ponds and a small lake with the help of an Upstream Thinking Grant from the West Country Rivers Trust. The principles are the same, keep water in the upper catchment to prevent flooding and slow the flow of pollution and nutrients off farms into the River Exe. Of course the ponds have become magnets for wild life; 7 goslings and 13 tufted ducklings made it their home last spring.

Today we are dealing with planning the work on the farm and reporting back on the difficulties we are having with the promised stewardship payments, it often feels like farming and the environment have reached the lowest level of priority in the new governmental order.

In the high winds before Christmas one of our ancient tin Dutch barns became a hovercraft and lifted off its foundations and crashed down again 2 metres down the hill - quite the clearing up job! I have a meeting to discuss and plan how we are going to restore and manage the damage sustained.

I head back home for tea and then some admin including writing a small webinar on our conservation work that is being delivered for the Webinar Vet during their remote conference on sustainability in February. That's about it for today!

What is your favourite part of the job?

Designing and implementing landscapes for wildlife, focusing on how we can improve diversity by using small and appropriate acreages on farms for storing water and promoting nature. Diagnosing the problems of our troubled agricultural landscapes, and treating them in a small way.

Watching the incredibly resilient response of wild life to any intervention of this type - it simply roars back if you give it a chance.

What is the most challenging part of your job?

Managing the finances of farming and achieving what is necessary for the environment in a country that prioritises urban issues.

Do you have any tips for achieving a good work-life balance?

Make lists and remember to stop and rest.

Engage with nature as much as possible and find a piece of water with all the accompanying life and just spend time looking at it and hearing it (we call it "the Pond effect").

How do veterinary professionals currently help to drive sustainability and what are the major opportunities they have?

This was beautifully illustrated by the talk by Paragon Vets at the Veterinary Green Discussion Forum. Combining good sustainability practices around, for example, gas usage and waste within a veterinary practice, with developing the environmental diversity in land owned by the practice, and engaging with the public on these issues allows us to really maximise our sphere of influence. There is a big role in advising farmers to back off trying to make unsuitable land (particularly flood plains) productive and to illustrate the financial advantages of using stewardship. We need to think carefully about the pharmacokinetics of the drugs we use including parasiticides and insecticides within the landscape.

What are your top tips for veterinary professionals wishing to take the first steps to drive sustainability in their roles?

Start to look at the agricultural and urban landscapes you are working within with a diagnostic eye to see how pathological they are and how our interventions with drugs, herd management, animal housing and waste disposal strategies radiate out into the landscape and our river catchments. Think about what small actions you can take to reduce your impacts as a veterinary professional – we all need to take responsibility and start somewhere!

If you could wave a magic wand and make one improvement to drive the sustainability impact of the veterinary profession, what would it be?

If I had a magic wand, I would create a strong and respected veterinary advisory service for managing animal health and production within a healthy landscape.